The cliche is the Nordic blue-eyed blond, or blue eyes with pale skin.

But scientists have decoded DNA found in the skeleton of an early European and found that he was most genetically related to Scandinavians with a surprising twist — he had blue eyes and dark skin. Continue reading →

British lawmakers report that Queen Elizabeth’s household finances are in such disarray that she has lost $50 million since 2001 and is now down to her last million pounds ($1.6 million) in the contingency fund, while Buckingham Palace and other royal residences “crumble” around her, according to the Telegraph. Continue reading →

We’re behind Philly. How did that happen? Click to see a larger image.

A survey by the American Bible Society ranks how often you read the Good Book and how accurate you think it is.

Chattanooga, Tenn., is the nearest to the Holy Scriptures.

“Not surprisingly,” the society says, “many cities in the East Coast continued to rank as the least Bible-minded in 2013. Among them: Providence, R.I.; Albany and Buffalo, N.Y.; Boston; and Portland, Maine.”

My grandmother passed away in 1996 of a fast-spreading cancer. She was non-communicative her last two weeks, but in that time, she left at least 20 index cards with scribbled letters on them. My cousins and I were between 8-10 years old at the time, and believed she was leaving us a code. We puzzled over them for a few months trying substitution ciphers, and didn’t get anywhere.

The family has guessed that the letters represented song lyrics, “based on some of the repeating segments.” But in her final, lucid hours, their grandmother — who would die before she reached 70 years of age — wasn’t thinking of pop songs that were played in their Minnesota house “in the 50s, 60s and early 70s.” Continue reading →